1) Ability to juice leafy greens
In my opinion the greatest benefit of juicing is the capacity to extract a raw live juice from leafy green vegetables. No other foods are as rich in vitamins, minerals and enzymes as leafy greens especially wheatgrass, spinach, kale, chard, cabbage etc.. Centrifugal juicers are very poor at juicing leafy greens and in effect simply cannot juice them. Our advice is to stick with masticating juicers (single gear = good, twin gear = best) which are excellent at extracting leafy green juice.

2) The time it takes to assemble, disassemble and clean a juicer
The time it takes to assemble, disassemble and clean a juicer is overhyped in many marketing brochures. Our experience tells us that once you’ve used a juicer a few times you become proficient at assembly, disassembly and cleaning. Yes many juicers have more parts but ultimately you are taking about seconds to rinse clean these parts under a running tap. A word of warning do not be overly swayed by one juicer claiming to be dramatically quicker to clean than the all the rest, we have not seen this magic juicer yet.

3) Feed chute size
The ability to juice whole apples and other fruits and vegetables is important for people who wish to reduce the prep time involved in chopping fruits and vegetables prior to juicing. Most centrifugal juicers have large feed chutes to take whole apples etc… Most masticating juicers have a smaller feed chute of typically 4 cms , this prevents over feeding of the feed chute and is also a safety requirement under law (to prevent kids from putting their hands down the chute!) Nonetheless your prep time is typically only increased marginally with masticating juicers, I find I only have to chop apples, beets and some large carrots.

4) Additional features & Accessories
Many juicers now come with a variety of food processing features. For example many can now make oils, nut butters, ice creams and sorbets, pasta, crush ice and coffee, can make soya and almond milk and a host of other grinding and mincing features. Ultimately we recommend your Juicer for Juicing, experience tells us that most of these other food processing features could be done using a cheap food processor and using your juicer regularly as a food processor could deteriorate its juicing performance, nonetheless keep an eye out in the product descriptions to see what accessories come with the juicers and if accessories can be purchased separately.

5) Juicer design and aesthetics
To get the most from your juicer we recommend you keep it visible in your kitchen otherwise it may end up unused in a cupboard somewhere. Many juicer designs are stunning; most of the leading manufacturers have tried to design a range of styles and colours for a contemporary kitchen environment. Consider the colour of other appliances in your kitchen, also consider the size and shape of your juicer and make sure to consider having space around your juicer for the collector bowls and for the produce you are juicing, also consider the space above your juicer where you will need to access the hopper to feed produce in. Many juicers are quite large and most now are of either horizontal or vertical persuasion, it is important to consider the juicer dimensions when choosing your juicer.